George W. Whipple, buried at Cemetery Road Cemetery, Randolph, Cattaraugus County, NY
George W. Whipple
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Memories of George W. Whipple In the morning of July 2 we moved some three miles and came to where we lay most of that day on a common or pasture under fire of shot and shell. Between 1 and 2 o'clock our company cook, Lem Rogers, brought us a camp kettle full of hot coffee. All day we saw our cavalry and the enemy skirmishing about. Once a couple of cavalrymen came together in a fight on horseback and they went at each other quite lively, being bout equally matched. Our man was reinforced and got the best of the other. Some time after five in the afternoon we had orders to fall in, moved to the left, got over a stone wall after the rails on top were thrown off and started through a field of wheat up to our waists. Here we got some stray bullets. Half way through this field we got a full volley and replied with our first shot. About this time Horace French, Co. F's first sergeant, was wounded and Captain Crowley, of Co. B fell. At the lower end of the wheatfield was another common or pasture with here and there a clump of bushes and here we were mixed up with other troops on our side. I stepped behind a clump of bushes while loading my gun and another soldier near me was struck by a bullet in the forehead and he fell against me. Capt. Fuller said "never mind George, forward." We made for the crest of the bluff in front occupied by the enemy and got there, lying down and firing. Capt. Fuller was just a little in advance and to the right of Co. F in between some rocks firing at some Rebel colors when the order came to us to fall back. He looked over his shoulder and asked who sent the order. Nobody seemed to know. An Aide of Gen. Meagher, of the Irish brigade came as fast as his horse could run, calling out to us to fall back and get out of there. We started back. As Fuller rose to his feet to move with us fell wounded near my feet. I helped him up. One of his legs seemed useless. I had hold of him on the left and some one assisted him on his right side and thus we made several rods to the rear followed by the enemy when a bullet struck him in the back and came out in front just under my arm. The other soldier helping then left us and I took the captain in my arms and partly carried and partly dragged him back to a small stream. As I took him in my arms he looked up at me and said "George, keep up good courage." I shall never forget that look. I put him behind a rock and straightened out his limbs for he was dying. Now the Rebels come on me and demanded my surrender with awful threats. It was hard to leave my best friend and captain. I requested them to let me get some trinkets out of his pockets as mementoes, but the reply was "go to the rear you d----d yankee son of a b____h." Two Confederate soldiers escorted me away. On the way we came to a Rebel lieutenant wounded who set on the ground leaning against a rock. He called us to him and said "Yank, got any water?" I carried my canteen to him, though my two guards objected some. He wanted to be carried to the ambulance. The guards reluctantly consented, we made a stretcher out of my shelter tent and carried him something like half a mile to their ambulances. The lieutenant seemed very grateful, took my name, company and regiment and gave me his name, etc., on a piece of paper which I lost. The men with the ambulances plied me with lots of questions, seeming to think I could tell them as much as a commanding general. My guards left me with the ambulance men, who took me with other prisoners further to the rear, and camped under a big black walnut tree. Soon more of our men appeared. Lyman Jeffords, of my company, with others, were brought in the morning, when we were taken back still further. There almost the first man I saw was Uncle Henry Whipple, of Co. H, 154th N.Y.V., and there were many more of different corps. There was so many of them I began to fear my brags the night before would not prove true, for I had told our captors that this time we were going to give them such a beating as they had never had; that even if they should win here, the north would raise a bigger army than ever and overwhelm them. All this they did not believe. They pretended to know that the north had been exhausted of soldiers, and they were sure to clean us out. The third of July was an awful day for both armies. We prisoners heard a bigger cannonade than ever before. That night we could hear and see that things were not going well with our hosts. Uncle Henry and I lay together, and a little before morning he got up and listened, and concluded the enemy was going to retreat. The morning of July 4th came, and their baggage trains were moving south toward the mountains. We were ordered to fall in. I had written a letter to send home and other prisoners had done the same, hoping some chance would offer to get them north. Passing a house on the road, a woman came out and offered to mail any letters we had. She received many letters from us, but I never learned that any of them reached their destination…
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